Mission:
The Knight Community Partners Program, a project of the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, works to improve the quality of life in the twenty-six U.S. communities where the Knight brothers owned newspapers.

Background:
Charles Landon Knight, publisher of the Akron Beacon Journal newspaper in the early 1900s, focused his philanthropy on helping financially disadvantaged students in Ohio pay for college. A few years after his death in 1933, his sons John S. and James L. Knight honored his efforts by establishing the Knight Memorial Education Fund to provide financial aid to college students from the Akron area. The Fund was folded into the brothers' new foundation in 1950. Over the last five decades, the foundation has developed a national journalism initiative to provide education to journalists and support a free press around the world. It has also continued to give back to the communities that had Knight newspapers when the Knight brothers were alive. While the programs are tailored to specific communities, the foundation generally makes grants in six areas: education, the well-being of children and families, housing and community development, economic development, civic engagement and positive human relations, and cultural life.

Outstanding Feature:
The foundation recently developed Web sites for each of the twenty-six communities that participate in the Community Partners Program. The Web pages for each community — from Long Beach, California, to Aberdeen, South Dakota — provide contact information for the community liaison program officer, research on local attitudes and opinions, the funding strategy for the area, and a list of the members of the local community advisory board. Each community Web site also offers links to local nonprofits and area newspapers.